Before you do anything...drain out the gas and put some fresh gas in it. Methanol lased gas has the shelf life of milk.

 

try some new spark plugs. if they're black and wet i would change them. then get it rejetted.

 

+1! if it was running last year and doesn't run now, the first thing I'd do is drain the entire fuel system - tank, lines, and carb float bowl - and get some fresh gas in there. Unlikely anything went wrong just sitting over the winter except gas going bad...

Also, your plugs should NOT be wet! They should be nice and tan. If they're wet and/or black, you're running too rich and your jets are lilely too big, or perhaps just not adjusted correctly. Running too rich does absolutely nothing good for your bike - it hurts your performance, fouls up your plugs and engine, and increases your fuel expenses for no reason... and it pollutes, too.

 

OK, I drained the tank, replaced the fuel line, and replaced the carb with a spare one.
I put new gas in, but it still won't start.

Once in a while I get a pop out the exhaust

Also, it seems like gas is coming out of the carb. It seems like some air is coming out the carb when I crank it. Maybe its a timing issue, I don't know.

 

I'm going to replace the spark plugs today and try it again. They are covered in soot.

 

I'd pull the plugs first and replace them and go from there.

 

Take the advice of all here. Q. What/how did the bike run prior to storage. Did it run properly, was the fuel tank full, did you use stabilizer? With new fuel check the carb for contaimaintes. Also clean and adjust the plugs..new would be better...also check the kill switch, sometimes it gets coroded...

 

OK, I replaced the plugs with new ones, and it started right up.

Looks like I'll need to make sure the plugs are good and clean in the future.

Thanks for all your help guys.

 

make sure you run it awhile and then take another look at the plugs. if they are wet and black or just black I would adjust the carb or have it rejetted.

 

I will take a look at the spark plugs when I get a chance to see how they look. Thanks for the advice.

When I bought this bike it had an S&S E on it and drag pipes for exhaust. The S&S carb always ran rich. The bike would backfire out the exhaust (too rich). Maybe it was the jetting. I don't know. When I replaced the drag pipes it seemed to run even richer.

I also replaced the champion spark plugs it was running with HD double plat plugs.

It looks like what happened was the rich mixture eventually fouled the spark plugs to the point that it would not start anymore. Maybe the HD double plat plugs require more voltage than the copper champion plugs required, again I don't know.

I have since replaced the HD double plat plugs with regular HD plugs and replaced the S&S carb with a rebuilt, stock Keihin butterfly carb.

It seems to run great with the keihin butterfly. It starts instantly, and there is no black smoke, and no backfire out the exhaust (too rich), and no pop through the carb (too lean). Throttle response is good too. After running it for a while I shut it off and it restarted instantly.

I know the keihin butterfly is not considered a good carb compared to the S&S or the CV, but my goal is for the bike to be completely stock, so rather than rebuilding or re-jetting the S&S, I put a rebuilt Keihin butterfly on it.

I also want to replace the S&S intake manifold with the equally disliked stock intake manifold and compliance fittings.

I want to do this for two reasons:

1. The compliance fittings and stock intake manifold cause the carb to stick out the side of the bike at least one inch less than the S&S manifold does. This is important to me because the air cleaner hits my knee.

2. The keihin carb fits better on the stock intake manifold since it has a smaller bore than the S&S.